


Of Doppelgangers and Sorcerers.

by AShinyTurquoise



Series: W.I.P Polish and Cleanout [3]
Category: Borderlands (Video Games)
Genre: Correct me if i'm wrong please, I didnt get far enough with this piece to need warnings i think, It's kinda a teeny bit morbid, It's not v/ shippy because that kinda content isnt really mentioned but it's kinda implied, Maybe - Freeform, Multi, Not worth tagging at the degree mentioned in this scrap
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-03
Updated: 2020-01-03
Packaged: 2021-02-27 03:28:20
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,407
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22100305
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AShinyTurquoise/pseuds/AShinyTurquoise
Summary: Sorta was an offshoot of an Dragons Keep AU i REALLY wanted to finish but never found the time or energy to do so before i had to sideline writing when life got busy.Jack was a sorcerer who was at one point renokwned for wreaking havoc and was maybe a tad too ambitious and used some borrowed magic from an ancient deity known as The Warrior for a time, Which wouldn't be an issue if he hadn't 'overused' the borrowed magic. Later it befell to his two companions to keep him in check as he end's up being more beast than sorcerer, Fortunately for Nisha and Wilhelm the Magical Taint keeps most of Jacks powers under lock and key.One of Jacks long time goals was to track down his doppelganger to use for nefarious means.Luckily for Timothy he didn't wind up in Jacks hand's until AFTER that goal of Jacks was wrote off for good, But now that he has him in his grasp Jack still doesn't want to let go despite everyone telling him it's useless.Luckily for Timothy this bout of bad luck gets him answers to questions he has been after for years, Even if not with favourable circumstances.Features both the tiny bit of writing i had + what i had digitalised of the background notes.
Series: W.I.P Polish and Cleanout [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1587130
Kudos: 3





	Of Doppelgangers and Sorcerers.

_**Mostly babbling and rambling and fragments, Sort of in some semblance of order but very barebones!** _

Jack was a reasonably normal sorcerer once, Until one day he bit off more than he can chew and got a bit cocky with wielding a type of magic.

It’s not stuff you fuck around with especially if said magic is tied to a demonic being but that future situation called for it but he drew on it more than he otherwise should have and wound up being changed, The magic gone sure but it left a little seed of influence behind.

It wasn't noticeable at first, It took a while for it to take root.

But when it did it became obvious and his friends were quick to wrangle him in and put him on a metaphorical (sometimes literal) leash. The influence varies quite a bit sometimes strong and very _very rarely_ it has little to no influence at all, Usually on the middle ground somewhere leaning towards the former degree.

Sure they never _had_ to do it and were by no means obliged to, But it was better than letting him go free and wreak havoc. The world had enough literal monsters and they didn't need what turned out to be the potential for an even worse monster going unrestrained and free.

In the process Jack did loose his grip on any innate magics (yeah they are still there just in a state of nigh uselessness) but if anything it didn't make him less dangerous, Instead of getting magic throw at you you risked being _quite literally_ eaten alive.

The main thing stopping him from having qualms about it with his ‘friends’ were former, Quite strong attachments especially as once it fully took root after it was starting to kick in it took quite a while before it started mellowing out and fluctuating in degrees of severity. (Also he’s...Possessive, When it comes to Wilhelm and Nisha (by extension Timothy))

Nisha felt a bit ambivalent about how being hopeful that it was going to be okay and that _Jack wasn't so stupid as to make such a stupid decision that stupid fu--_

Wilhelm however never overly saw it as his business despite making comments but in the end felt a bit remorseful about not being more stern about it. (He never felt it was his place to interfere, What Jack got up to was his business after all)

Jack dug himself into this hole and if it wasn’t for two lone souls who were willing to wait it out a bit to see the outcome he would have been well and truly dead and six feet under by now. (He should be grateful for their persistence)

That and their... _Attachments_ were less than platonic ‘friendship’ in the first place so their decisions were not easy ones to make, That and the changes were sort of gradual and it had taken a while to determine the catalyst. (It didn't just happen overnight after all, It took months let alone nearly a full year or two before most of anything started taking effect, So gradually it wasn’t... _Immediately apparent_ )

Though

To be fair the major piece of the puzzle only clicked into place when they were going through Jack's notes.

If it would have made a difference Nisha would've caved Jack's nose in for not being more careful with such things

But that was then

Now things had settled into a different sort of dynamic and they had...Sort of at least, Gotten used to it. It would of solved nothing it was done and dusted and blatantly old news, Even if albeit old news that hadn’t surfaced until at that point.

Indeed they both had days where they wished things were a little more like old times, But there is nothing they can do about it so they trudge along and make do.

On the plus side it really is effective if they ever need to interrogate someone.

Nothing like someone slowly or ever so quickly changing their mind about keeping the info to themselves while ever so slowly (ooooorrrr not) being eaten alive piece by piece, Bite by bite.

Nisha isn’t sure if she should feel bad about a little burst of sadistic glee from this sometimes.

But

She has had a lot of time to get used to it so it hardly bothers her as much as the notion of ‘being bothered by _not_ being bothered’ does.

Though it wears thin on her consciousness sometimes that nowadays Jack feels albeit more like an super deadly cherished pet than their original dynamic that the trio had going...Though albeit more humanlike.

Sometimes she wonders if prior attachments saved both her and Wilhelm from becoming meals more than dealing with the occasional nips and nibbles they sometimes (or a lot) have to put up with.

Some days it’s easier to drag a conversation out of him whereas other days you’d have better luck getting a clear cut verbal based conversation _out of a_ _fucking_ _tree_.

(Then again treant’s exist so that might not be the most accurate saying but a _tree_ not a _treant_ is the point here)

Also featuring Timothy as the poor sod who delivers corpses one time and Jack takes an interest in and sort of won't let go back Wilhelm sighs and starts drafting up a letter not to expect him back any time soon (if ever) and Nisha scolds Jack to no avail and Timothy is confused, Oh so very confused.

Well

At least he didn’t become food?

So that was a good thing right?

Also learnt the hard way that this can either be considered fortunate or highly unfortunate situation depending on how one looks at it.

It _was_ settled at unfortunate, That is up until one thing that happened made him think _it’s not all bad_ once you get past how incredibly bizarre and unlucky the situation is. How _unlucky he was_ to have even wound up in this situation in the first place.

That and that other thing was unprecedented and to be quite frank was jarring, More jarring than the corpse eating thing. (Then again what did he expect they wanted the corpses for? Either he wasn’t told the full story or the person they contacted for the AOK for the corpses didn’t know either)

He tries not to think about the fact that he saw Jack eat those corpses he brought with him even though it was pretty hard to ignore the whining about how they didn't taste as good because it wasn’t warm, Fresh and most importantly _alive_.

Despite the complaining he basically wolfed down the corpses anyway, Making a mess of the courtyard while he was it it getting blood everywhere as he unceremoniously tore chunks out of the corpses. (Nisha made a joke about how next time he should eat over the garden)

It wasn't very graceful; Not that one would expect it to have been in the first place. Though it started off plain enough of not slightly restrained but as time wore on the _feasting_ got clearly more animalistic in a way one might think of as akin to a show of hedonistic gluttony at it’s finest if not albeit quite messy.

He (Timothy) also loathes the fact that he has found out he is (essentially) a victim of a specific doppelganger phenomena. (Naturally occurring mind you so his luck really is just _that bad_ )

Figures the reason why a few things are out of the norm was _because his doppelganger was? Is? A fucking sorcerer who fucked around with magic too much (or given how old Jack IS more he is a doppelganger of the former)_

That train of thought was sort of bitter almost as Timothy had to stop clenching his teeth so tightly because _now his jaw hurts_.

Then again he had every right to be bitter because he had his whole life practically set out before him with what he wanted to do , _What he was good at,_ But his magic just up and stopped working one day and everything was scrapped. Mostly because Jack pushed a little too far one day with his magic based probing and instead of responding his magic went into hibernation. It was confusing and in his honest opinion perhaps the most bizarre and frustrating thing that happened to him in his life because the timing _was so terribly ill timed._

He also found out this ‘Jack’ was _quite possessive_ . The whole doppelganger thing sort of being a very strong point of interest to the other. And even if he couldn’t ‘keep’ Timothy under the guise of his original intentions _now that he had him right here_ he was not eager to really let him go either.

But at least the other duo were not unwelcoming which helped some.

It still didn’t make the arrangement any less...Unusual.

The wolf ( _a giant one nonetheless, Quite intimidating at first)_ ...Unexpected, Not the best substitute for the cats back with his family but it helped to further take the edge off the situation. That was, Up until he was dragged off without warning by Jack. (He got the feeling he wouldn’t be able to return soon in ever and...He _wasn’t exactly wrong_ )

And yeah.

Timothy is just glad he is alive honestly. The prospect of being treated more like a living possession at the moment was a little irksome.

But...Could be worse, He could of had the same fate those corpses did, Getting eaten as unceremoniously as they had been.

Wilhelm’s prosthetics? Cybernetics? are instead enchanted clockwork or w/e. (Though he still has both eyes)

Still tossing between clockwork (or some other more medieval-esque machination style) or something else like say some enchanted/spellworked/spellbound material of some other kind. Like rock/plant or w/e. (Still can’t decide between ‘clockwork’ or more ‘golem-like’ as far as this goes and both sound like such nice possibilities it’s like ‘PICK ONE’ but i also can’t because i like both possible design variants *cries*)

If they ever take Jack into town they like literally have to muzzle him and everything. _(Just in case)_

Also cover him in robes’n shit so nobody can get a good look at him.

It doesn’t click until waaaayy later that Jack is actually a certain fabled sorcerer that just completely dropped off the grid one day.

Then it also clicks why when Timothy had to make an delievery to a certain specific village one week that had a lot of experiences with said sorcerer why everyone treated him with suspicion as if expecting him to pull something.

Expecting it to have all been some elaborate joke.

Timothy later on is like ‘Hello masochism i didn’t see you there’ and learns something new about himself one day. He’s on the fence about whether it’s a good or bad thing. Considering the context it could just as easily lean either way given the... _Peculiars_ of the situation.  
  
  
 _ **And now the story bit** _  
  
  


So it was settled. Today? Today has officially gone off the deep end, Timothy has no idea WHY he even bothered getting out of bed this morning. If he knew THIS was going to be the result of the delivery trip he would of just...Decided to sit it out and pretend to be sick to get somebody else to do it.   
  
_What did they even WANT a wagon full of corpses for any way?_ Timothy thought with an huff.

Whatever the reason the local lord thought it was good enough to kill some prisoners that had been sitting in the dungeon for a while _as they weren't sure what to do with these particular prisoners_ for so they even _HAD_ corpses to send off.  
  
Timothy sighed and raised his hands to his face; Disturbing his cloak just a little as two of the people who resided in this stupid tower he had to go out of the way to _deliver a wagon full of corpses of all things_ to -because apparently he wasn't good for anything else any more- were inspecting it.   
  
The woman was rolling her eyes and saying ‘Well at least they're in decent condition’ and whoever it was that was dressed in a ratty yellow cloak that looks to have endured many bloodstains that has the telltale signs of having been enchanted to hell and back because distinguishing who or what was underneath that cloak was difficult as at first glance everything was -and is- a complete and utter _indistinguishable blur._  
  
The figure in question had taken to poking a corpse with a stick in a manner that is likely to be either disgust or morbid curiosoty but he couldn’t tell for sure because he wasn’t paying enough attention to _even try_ looking past the enchantments (not that Timothy has had much luck in recent years with anything related related to magic in the first place)-- Whilst Timothy’s train of thought went down the bland bitter memories of all his plans he had set out for himself suddenly crashing and burning leading to this, Whatever _THIS_ even is the figure had started whining about how ‘The Corpses aren’t even _WARM_! Fresh is best’ there was a huff then a dejected sounding ‘Fresh and warm is best not cold and dead’ to which the woman with the leather coat and hat and tinted lips pursed said lips and responded with a slight hint of snark ‘Well you just have to live with that, It’s better than starving’ which made Tim quirk an eyebrow and wonder if he was hearing things right (Well there was no guarantee that the figure was even _human_ ) to which he wasn't completely sure as the enchantments seem to have rubbed off on the vocalisations and they sounded... _Wrong_. Occasionally there was the tiniest fraction of clarity but it was an blink-and-you’ll-miss-it ordeal and thus far the occurrences hadn’t registered until some point after they were over.  
  
Whilst that exchange was going on and Timothy had the tired train of thought along the lines of _please just hurry the fuck up and get the corpses of the cart so i can take the cart and_ _ **just go home**_ , Partway through his train of thought he focused on the figure absent mindedly and the second the ‘blur’ cleared for a fraction of a second (the sudden clarity taking Timothy by surprise as about several years ago his natural affinity for magic and seeing through it just suddenly upped and became un-.cooperative so getting _any_ clarity at all snapped him out of his thoughts) before going back to blur central for a few seconds more the figure -Which at that point had an arm raised to where it’s mouth should be and all Timothy had caught in that fraction of an second was a green eye, Tanned flesh and sharp teeth- had in the fraction of those few seconds afterwards dropped the arm, Leaving it to flop back towards the body that it’s attached to, And Timothy found the hood of his cloak being flung back and he froze the figure now standing imposingly in front of him.   
Probably scowling-- Not that Timothy knew for sure but it was a wild guess because if the figure could sense the disguise was seen through for even a fraction of a second they are unimpressed if that was their instantaneous reaction...The figure seemed awfully defensive.  
  
Then...Laughter? The figure full on laughing to which the woman had just sighed without even bothering to look, That was up until the figure had then barked an startlingly familiar -But rougher sounding- amused voice “Hey Nish! Look!” as the figure pulled it’s own hood back with one hand as the other was firmly keeping him in place via the harsh grasp on his shoulder, The sharp nails-- bordering on claws really digging into his shoulder making him uncomfortable.  
  
You see, Timothy was aware of this ‘Doppelganger’ phenomenon but honestly? The pieces fell in place quickly the second he saw the figure bore an uncomfortably close resemblance to himself.   
Unfortunate. In this case ‘unfortunate’ was no exaggeration. Or to be more accurate it was a double edged sword it had perks -- Like in Timothy’s case his magical gifts were similar, But also drawbacks, So many drawbacks, Drawbacks like you wouldn't _believe_. (He had a good idea of who this person was now and their rampant jerk-like asshole behaviour in the past has proven an issue for himself, Having to go that much further to _even so_ _much as_ _prove_ that he wasn’t going to cause trouble or what he was asking wasn't some elaborate _joke_ , Before the guy disappeared off the face of the map he had developed _quite the_ _reputation_ )

The only way to tell the two apart was the fact that Timothy’s hair held a reddish tone under the sunlight and the light splattering of freckles, An nigh perfect carbon copy otherwise if one disregarded a few other minute details.  
  
Things just went from ‘Hurry the fuck up i just wanna go home’ to ‘holy shit and i’m uncomfortable on an existential level’ in no more than ten seconds.   
  
This...This was certainly a pickle-- A not very good pickle at that. This one specific sorcerer was presumed dead after all sightings and any signs of his works and all tracks leading to im falling dead a decade or two back. And Timothy in the past has had difficulty with being accused of being this very piece of shit (it made a delivery to a village this very asshole terrorized sporadically in the past and made it very hard to get the deliveries to be treated as genuine because he had the misfortune of looking like this asshole-- _Well at least he sounded like one and judging by this behavior likely very much_ _**is** _ ) and up until his magic became quite un-cooperative several years back he went from ‘got my life in order!’ to ‘I’m useless and been reduced to an errand boy’ and as the pieces fell in place-- And the longer that _stupid ass_ _**claw** _ dug into his shoulder he was gradually getting more and more annoyed.

It was supposed to be a simple job. But it seems fate or luck had other plans.Nisha as she turned to look at Jack’s incessant barking was more in an ‘what is it now’ manner, Then there was a scowl, Then lastly a sigh.   
  
Nisha? Nisha is glad it happened now rather than _before that_ happened. At least this poor kid isn’t going to wind up with the fate Jack had in mind, There had been many ‘If i find a doppelganger of me’ talks that eventually morphed to ‘If i find that doppelganger’ and...It sounded like a waste of talent.   
However after so long searching and finding out the one was right under his nose this entire time -he just wasn't looking thoroughly enough- as the duo knew well enough this kid came from the closest town _because that’s where this cart came from_ .   
  
Timothy was confused as the exasperated look shot in the direction of the man beside him was replaced with an _almost_ sympathetic glance in his direction to which timothy quirked an eyebrow at primarily because why a sympathetic look at him? Was there a reason? Was there something he should know? Did he miss something blatantly obvious? Whats up? What warranted him being looked at sympathetically?

[A gap i’ll sort out later, It needs filling but the ‘ol words are not co-operating right now]

Okay so it turns out there WAS a reason, After being held by both shoulders and told casually that ‘You are here now and you're mine, I’m not letting you go’ is, Uh...Kinda _not_ the most pleasant of experiences. It’s jarring and those all too sharp teeth made the casual statement seem menacing, That and uh, Jack sure likes to dig his claws into people when holding their shoulders certainly didn’t help.   
  
Worst and most bizarre day ever Timothy thought to himself as he was petting the giant wolf --Which was called Wolf, He was informed that that was the case...Not very original but straightforward and perhaps simple? Yes-- on the makeshift lounge, The giant wolf currently sprawled over his lap and gladly soaking in the affections.


End file.
